Why The SBIC Doesn’t Work For Venture Capital Anymore

There are so many things wrong in the article I felt compelled to write about it. This isn’t a knock on the writer (Alicia Wallace) – I like Alicia and think she does a good job. Rather, it’s an example of the difference between signal and noise in any kind of reporting around the VC industry.

I’m an investor in over 40 VC funds around the world (mostly in the US) and three of them are SBIC funds. Each of the SBIC funds were raised in the 2000 – 2002 time period. On paper, only one is in positive return territory as a fund, but the SBIC leverage is a substantial negative factor for the LP investors in that particular fund. And, in the other two, I don’t expect to ever see any of my capital back because of the SBIC leverage. Furthermore, I don’t believe any of the GPs in any SBIC-backed fund would ever take money from the SBIC again.

So I’m speaking from at least a little experience – albeit indirectly – with the SBIC, as I’ve never been a GP in a fund that had SBIC leverage.

The article starts off saying that “Matthew Varilek has traveled across the state, proselytizing the potential benefits of the Small Business Investment Company Program.” As a partner in one of the most visible VC firms in Colorado and an LP in many of the Colorado VC firms, I’ve never heard from Matthew or anyone from the SBIC. Matthew, if you really want to have a deep discussion about why the SBIC program isn’t effective for VC funds anymore, feel free to give me a shout. I’d be happy to meet with you.

Next, there is the wonderful PR quote about the SBIC that says “Since the program’s inception, SBIC “success stories” include the funding of companies such as Apple, Costco and FedEx when they were burgeoning small businesses.” The SBIC was instrumental in the creation of the venture capital business. The Small Business Investment Act of 1958 helped catalyze many of the VC firms created in the early 1960s. When I first heard about VC firms in the late 1980s, and my first company (Feld Technologies) started writing portfolio management software for some Boston-based VC firms, many of them had funds with SBIC leverage, although even by the late 1980s this was changing and many of them had shifted away from the SBIC. If you want to see a fun quote on it, read A History of Silicon Valley which quotes:

“ …many venture capital pioneers think the SBIC program did little to advance the art and practice of venture investing. The booming IPO market proved the model of investing in new companies, as some SBICs cash out at attractive levels. SBICs did give a boost to early venture firms, and some like Franklin “Pitch” Johnson, profiled below, thought the new law made the US “see that there was a problem and that [venture investing] was a way to do something… it formed the seed of the idea and a cadre of people like us.” Bill Draper, the first West Coast venture capitalist, has been more blunt: “[Without it] I never would have gotten into venture capital. . . it made the difference between not being able to do it, not having the money.” Many believe SBICs filled a void from 1958 to the early 1970s, by which point the partnership-based venture firms took off. The US government, however, lost most of the $2 billion it put into SBIC firms.”

So, while Apple, Costco, and FedEx benefited, the PR would be more credible if the SBIC was trumpeting iconic companies created after 1990 or even 2000, especially where the lead investors (rather than follow on investors) had SBIC capital.

Peter Adams, head of Rockies Venture Club, is quoted a few times. I like and respect Peter, so this isn’t aimed at him, but rather at the clear lack of understanding of the capital dynamics around VC funds.

“It looks really great on the surface,” said Peter Adams, executive director of the Rockies Venture Club, a nonprofit aimed at connecting investors and entrepreneurs. “Then when you dig into it, there were some problems.” Adams, who has been involved in many of the meetings with the SBA and members of the investment community, said the greatest concerns voiced by investors and venture capitalists involved management team qualifications, investment track records and the addition of debt to the equation. No. 1 for us is they want a management team with multiple people that have track records in venture capital and have worked together as a team before,” he said. “I can see where they’re going with it, but the VC industry in Colorado has been fairly decimated through the economic downturn.”

Peter is right about the context, but has two fundamental things wrong here. First, the VC industry in Colorado wasn’t decimated through the economic downtown. It was decimated because of lack of performance between 2001 and 2009, just like much of the rest of the VC industry around the US. There’s nothing special about Colorado in this mix, and it has nothing to do with the economic downtown. This dynamic has been reported thousands of times so I don’t need to go through it again, but we don’t have to look back very far to hear the drum beat from the media, LPs, and everyone else about how “VC is dead.” And if you’re curious, it wasn’t too long ago that Silicon Valley was also dying.

The other problem here is the need of the SBIC to invest in “a management team with multiple people that have track records in venture capital and have worked together as a team before.” Any VC firm that fits this qualification is unlikely to have difficulty raising money in today’s environment, and subsequently has no need for the SBIC leverage. And, more importantly, the only firms that will look for SBIC leverage are one’s that don’t have this, which is a classic adverse selection problem.

Then there’s this:

The recession also then plays into requirements that the management team members have been involved in a meaningful number of successful exits during a four- to six-year period. “From 2008 to 2013, that was not a good time for exits,” Adams said.

Huh, what? At Foundry Group, our significant exits (at least 10x capital returned) since we raised our first fund in 2007 include AdMeld, Zynga, MakerBot, and Gnip. We’ve had plenty of other exits, but these are the big ones. One of those companies, Gnip, is Boulder-based and another from our older funds (Rally Software) also generated a greater than 10x return for us. Techstars (which we helped start) have also had a steady stream of significant exits, including local Boulder companies like Filtrbox, GoodApril, and SocialThing. And then you’ve got plenty of Boulder / Denver monsters on paper – some in our portfolio (like SendGrid and Sympoz) and others like Zayo, Ping, Logrhythm, and Datalogix. Finally, if you look across the country, the exits have been awesome the past three years.

It keeps going. There’s talk about the “angel cliff” (e.g. we need funds to invest between angels and VCs – nope, been there – remember “gap capital” – not so effective) and the SBA rules and regulations (which I believe are toxic and inhibiting to a successful VC fund.)

One of the other problem is SBA and SBIC’s behavior in governance of the fund. The paperwork is silly and the overhead is non-trivial. The control over distributions and negative incentives to hold or distribute capital often generates bad decisions when companies go public. And at least one close friend who is a partner in an SBIC fund has now found a new LP to buy out the SBIC so they could actually invest capital in their winners, rather than be limited by the SBIC’s constraints on the amount of capital you can invest in any particular company.

The SBIC could be a powerful force for good in the venture capital industry. But it has to approach things very different and based on my experience with the SBA over the past decade, I don’t see it happening unless there is real leadership somewhere in coordination with leaders in the VC industry. I’m certainly willing to help, if only someone bothered to reach out to me.

UPDATE: It turns out my partner Seth Levine had met with Matthew a while ago. Seth said “Your blog was right on and much of the type of thing I related to Matt and some senior guys he brought in. The gist of my conversation with them was pushing them to consider a different model – that the current one basically led to lowest common denominator GPs and sub-optimal returns. Plus the SBIC leverage could be crushing. I don’t think they have a ton of flexibility around this but they at least listened to the feedback. I’m going to see a bunch of them in a few weeks – I agreed to help judge a business plan competition they were hosting. Like you I’m not a huge fan of the program as it has existed but I give the new guys some credit for both reaching out and trying to be proactive about thinking through this.”

UPDATE 2: Matthew Varilek reached out to me and we are setting up a time to talk.

Interesting…While I’m hopeful about symbiosis between public and private sectors in education, healthcare, retirement, and entrepreneur development, your post underscores the issues that arise across the board with government programs. I remember SBA doing a workshop on small business loans here in Sacramento around 2008 or ’09 and actually refunding attendees’ admission after presenters narrowly evaded being pummeled with rotten tomatoes. SCORE is also a program with so much potential (I’m thankful for my mentor), but focuses on debt finance (with collateral, of course) and lengthy business plans for small businesses (pretty much ignoring enterprise development) and doesn’t eat its own dog food.

Anyway, this got a chuckle out of me:
“…I’ve never heard from Matthew or anyone from the SBIC. Matthew, if you really want to have a deep discussion about why the SBIC program isn’t effective for VC funds anymore, feel free to give me a shout. I’d be happy to meet with you.”

http://www.feld.com bfeld

I’m always happy to help!

Ryan Lemire

I spent the last 12 years supporting the federal government, the Department of Defense in particular, as a contractor. I have very recently been introduced to the startup journey through The Iron Yard accelerator in Spartanburg SC. I can assure anyone reading this blog that you should stay far away from any government program. Woe is the entrepreneur or investor that gets allured by the Siren song of government programs because underneath the water, there be a monster. The monster’s name is bureaucracy and it will devour a startup, not in one bite but in a thousand nibbles.

http://www.derekscruggs.com/ Derek

I generally stay away from government, but with my first company in Chicago in the late nineties we greatly benefitted from a matching funds program from the State of Illinois. It was less bureaucratic than I expected, but I don’t know how effective it was overall.

I remember going to some kind of awards event where I got to shake hands with Secretary of State George Ryan. He later became governor, then went to jail for corruption. Good times.

LD Eakman

If they want an LP perspective. Send them my way. We love the leverage for our credit/senior equity growth/buyout funds. Doesn’t work for venture at the single fund level. Might work to have leverage (big fat maybe) at the portfolio level if they got rid of other limitations and let experienced LP/GPs find a way to make it work.

http://www.feld.com bfeld

Will do!

http://blogmutt.com Scott Yates

Not disagreeing with any of your points, but I met a month or so ago with Matthew and he does seem to be trying hard within the context of what he can do as an agent of the US Government. He didn’t say anything disparaging about the government to me, but it’s no surprise that things move a bit slower within the framework of a federal bureaucracy. I’m glad you are going to meet with him.

http://www.feld.com bfeld

I have no doubt he’s a good guy trying hard. That’s different than the program being effective.

http://www.startupmanagement.org/ William Mougayar

Now you understand Canada’s government involvement in venture capital and startups.
(for the online record, I’m not a fan)